A known vehicle door lock apparatus is disclosed in a Japanese patent application publication published on Jun. 13, 2000 as Toku-Kai 2000-160900. The disclosed vehicle door lock apparatus includes a link mechanism connected with an outside handle and an inside handle for allowing vehicle door opening, a lever mechanism directly connected with a key cylinder provided at the outside handle for locking and unlocking the vehicle door by conducting a changeover of engagement and disengagement of the link mechanism in response to rotation operation of the key cylinder, and a drive mechanism for locking and unlocking the vehicle door by conducting the changeover of engagement and disengagement of the link mechanism by an electric drive in response to a controlling condition. Through operation of the outside handle or the inside handle, the vehicle door is allowed to be open through the link mechanism. Through the rotation operation of the key cylinder, engagement and disengagement of the link mechanism is changed over through the lever mechanism and the door is locked and unlocked. Further, with the electric drive, engagement and disengagement of the link mechanism is changed over through the drive mechanism and the door is locked and unlocked.
In the vehicle door lock apparatus disclosed in the publication mentioned above, because the key cylinder is provided at the outside handle, a rotation shaft direction of the key cylinder is dependent on the form of the door design and is not extended in a single direction. Thus, in order to connect this key cylinder with the lever mechanism, a bracket angle has been adjusted for fixing a door lock actuator accommodating the lever mechanism to the door lock body for dealing with this problem. That is, an individual bracket is prepared in response to the particular door design, and the rotation shaft direction of the lever mechanism is adjusted in response to the angle restricted by the bracket for achieving a direct connection between the key cylinder and the lever mechanism. Accordingly, the brackets are not versatile and the number of required parts is increased, as is the manufacturing cost, according to the number of different bracket types.
To try to decrease the number of different bracket types, the key cylinder is required to be directly connected with the door lock actuator (lever mechanism) provided in a specified position. With this approach, flexibility associated with the mounting angle (rotation shaft direction) is significantly restricted.